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Alyson DeNardo , partner at Mac Venture Capital , founder and CEO of Alden and partner at M Ventures talks about first time chats with investors, what kind of mistakes does she see founders making the most and what you, as a founder should pay attention to prior to the meeting. Alyson's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alysondenardo/ Mac Venture Capital: http://macventurecapital.com/ Alden: h...

Nick Cobb , Senior Software Engineering manager at Aurora , active angel investor and an advisor to multiple startups talks about operators as angel investors and why most operators join syndicates/funds rather than investing by themselves.  Nick's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/loyaltyarm/ Nick's book recommendation: Angel, by Jason Calacanis . Aurora: https://aurora.tech/ Nick's Twit...

Ashish Bhatia , software engineer, active angel investor and an advisory board member of 5 different startups talks about the journey of the first time founders. In this episode we've discussed what are the major mistakes that founders tend to make, what kind of advice they can expect from mentors like Ashish and how to get in front of investors. Ashish's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashi...

Joel Ifill , Founder and CEO at DASH Systems talks about their unique technology, how they manage to protect it without shoving NDAs in everyone's face and how they managed to prove such a complicated concept. For everyone in deep tech - this is an episode for you. Joel's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joel-ifill-3149a06b/ DASH Systems: http://www.dash.aero/ DASH Twitter: https://twitter.co...

Jonathan Wasserstrum , CEO and Co-Founder at SquareFoot and lead of a syndicate and a rolling fund talks about running a rolling fund, how it is different from a regular VC or a syndicate and also what difference does it make for the founder which entity invests in them. We also discussed Jonathan's own fundraising experience and where he believes the PropTech industry is headed. Jonathan's Linked...

Alessandro Gnoli, Engineering Manager at Google talks about getting talent from top firms to get in your startups. In this episode we spoke about raising money from top tier employees of large corporations, what are the pros and cons and how a startup founder can catch their attention. Alessandro's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alessandrognoli/ Another episode from this series: https://www...

Simon Gong, Senior Manager, Capacity Engineering & Analysis at Facebook talks about startup founders being the first time team managers. We spoke about the major problems that they face as team managers, how they can prepare themselves for what's coming up and how to solve some of the issues that appear on your manager's path. Simon's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/simongong/ Book on be...

Nick Miceli , Senior Tech Lead/Engineering Manager at Google talks about assembling the right team, choosing to go remote or hiring within your city, going through a dev-shop or contractors and other choices that the startup founder has to make while building the product. We also spoke about the major problems team managers face and how to deal with them. Nick's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/...

Shruti Gandhi , General Partner and Founding Engineer at Array Ventures talks about how she managed to get into the VC space and what are the most valuable skills needed to do so. We also discussed investing in Deep tech and the big problems that it's solving and how Shruti approaches it. Shruti's SubStack: ShrutiGandhi.substack.com Shruti's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shrutigandhi/ Arra...

Michael Proman , Managing Director at Scrum Ventures talks about the due-diligence process and why some investors like to "take their time" while doing it. We also discuss what should founders do if an investor is already 2 months into "due-diligence" and still didn't give a definite response. Michael's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-proman-a2a52b7/ Scrum Ventures: https://scrum.vc/...

Christina Lopes , Founder and CEO at FidoCure talks about how she came up with an idea, how she tested it out and raised her first rounds of funding. She also explained how she managed to get the attention of such notable investors as a16z, Tau ventures, YC and Lerer Hippeau. Christina's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christina-lopes-8679455/ FidoCure: https://www.fidocure.com/ Episode of F...

Joe Tonnos , principal at Mistral Equity Partners and Co-Founder at Ketch Ventures talks about his experience of creating SPACs and how founders can benefit from them. We also spoke about the general structure of SPACs and how they differ from other options of going public. We also discussed the future of consumer startups and how it looks like with the new vaccines being distributed. Joe's Linked...

Carey Anne Nadeau, Co-CEO of Loop talks about what it means to be a Co-CEO and how that works, how Loop managed to raise over $3 million in such a short time and what led her into this field. We also spoke about diversity (the lack of it) amongst founders and specifically founders in the InsureTech and how founders can use it to their advantage. Carey's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/careya...

Mary D'Onofrio , Vice President at Bessemer Venture Partners (the oldest VC firm in the US) talks about choosing the right growth investor for your company and about the preparation to that stage (explaining how to get in touch with growth investors early). We also spoke about the major differences between fundraising on early and growth stages. Mary's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mary-d-...

Jonathan Anderson , Co-Founder & CEO at Candu talks about what happens after each round of fundraising and what are the major differences between the pre-seed and seed rounds. We also spoke about how Candu came up with its pricing and discussed the ways founders of startups can price their products. Jonathan's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jonathankanderson/ Candu: https://www.candu.ai...

Ryan Li , Co-Founder at Deep Ventures talks about the deep tech investing and how he sees it. We also spoke about how he managed to raise and run a syndicate while being a college student and how investors reacted to this. And we discussed what Deep Ventures' team looks at while evaluating a startup. Ryan's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryan-d-li/ Deep Ventures: https://angel.co/deepventur...

Amit Garg , Managing Partner and Co-Founder at Tau Ventures talks about deep tech investing and the AI field. We discussed how VCs make their decisions while evaluating complicated deep-tech startups. We also discussed how AI is used now, where it is going and what are the major misconceptions that people have about this field (hint: Terminators won't kill us any time soon). Tau Ventures: https://...

Laurent Grill , partner at Luma Launch and we spoke about the use of operational experience in startup investing. We also discussed which companies shouldn't try to raise money from VCs, what are the alternative sources of capital and what are the major mistakes that Laurent sees student founders making. Laurent's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/laurentgrill/ Luma Launch: https://www.luma.in...

Ali Jamal , Growth and Product Executive, Founding Partner at First Check Ventures , Angel Investor and a Startup Advisor talks about the major mistakes that founders make while pitching their ideas. We also spoke about what qualifies as a competitive advantage for a startup and how to present it to others. Ali's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mralijamal/ Ali's Twitter: https://twitter.com/...

Daniel Faber , CEO at Orbitfab explains why he decided to go into the space field, what is happening there right now and what is more importantly - how to raise money in the field that is very capital-intense? We spoke about what it takes to get to such a complicated space and what Daniel's advice would be here for aspiring founders going into this industry. Daniel's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin...

Mark Stokes CEO and Co-Founder at Magdrive , a company that is developing a plasma thruster for the new space age talks about raising money for such complicated projects, what it takes to get into the space startup field, what are the major pitfalls in the space startup world and how to avoid them. The next episode about fundraising in the deep-tech/hard-tech field is coming up Friday. Mark's Link...

Andrew Gluck , General Partner at irrvrntVC talks about how startup founders should choose investors for every stage of fundraising that they go through. We also talked about what qualities should founders look for in VCs and why is it important. irrvrntVC: https://www.irrvrnt.com/ Andrew's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/azg/ Crunchbase: https://www.crunchbase.com/home

Stiven Rodríguez , Co-founder and COO at Heru talks about how they managed to raise such a large pre-seed round, why they decided to satart a company in Mexico instead of the US and how his work at Uber helped him. We also talked about how they pivoted after going to YC and how they have gone through 371 ideas choosing the best one. Covered the offline promotion of Heru and how does it work. Stive...

Adam Jackson , Founder & CEO at Braintrust talks about how he managed to close a round during the covid and how different it was from the "normal" fundraisings. We spoke about early stage fundraising VS raising for Series A+ and much more. Adam's linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ajackson/ Braintrust: https://www.usebraintrust.com/

McKeever (Mac) Conwell , Managing Director at RareBreed Ventures talks about investing in minorities through the RareBreed Ventures fund and also talks about what major metrics he personally looks at when reviewing a startup. Mac's Twitter: https://twitter.com/MacConwell RareBreed Ventures: https://www.rarebreed.vc/